If you would turn with me in a Bible to Mark chapter 1, we'll be looking at that at the
end of that chapter tonight.
If you're looking in one of the few Bibles, it is on page 837.
We're looking at Mark chapter 1, starting at verse 40 and going to the end of the chapter.
It says this,
And a leper came to him, came to Jesus, imploring him and kneeling, said to him,
If you will, you can make me clean.
Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him,
I will be clean.
And immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean.
And Jesus sternly charged him and sent him away at once and said to him,
See that you say nothing to anyone, but go, show yourself to the priests,
and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded for a proof to them.
But he went out and began to talk freely about it and to spread the news so that Jesus could no longer
openly enter a town, but was out in desolate places.
And people were coming to him from every quarter.
A few years ago, the New York Times published an article by a doctor
who works in an intensive care unit at a hospital.
And he began the article by telling this story.
He says,
It was one night when I was on call, I visited a patient who had been in the ICU for nine days,
recovering from a procedure to remove a major blood clot.
She was doing well, breathing on her own, with normal blood pressure and regular heartbeat.
After a moment, she opened her eyes.
Welcome, doctor, she said.
Would you like me to make you a drink?
You know where everything is, she said, and make me one as well.
Well, I asked her where she was.
In my apartment, she said.
I walked up to her IV pole and squeezed the bag of saline that hung next to her bed.
She thanked me and went off to sleep.
The article went on to say about a third of patients who spend more than five days in an ICU
experience some form of psychotic reaction.
Even if they've never had any psychiatric problems before,
patients may experience anxiety, become paranoid, hear voices and see things that are not there,
become disoriented, agitated, or even violent.
Now, of course, doctors want to know why this happens.
Why does being in a hospital seem to create new problems, even as it solves other problems?
Is it a response to physical pain?
Or is it sleep deprivation from the nurses waking you up every hour during the night?
Or is it that you feel like you're no longer in control of your life?
Well, all those things could play a role, but one of the major realities of being in a hospital,
especially being in an ICU, is being isolated.
Being isolated from normal routines and from normal interactions with family and friends,
neighbors, and co-workers.
Now, being in the ICU is maybe an extreme example, but sickness of whatever kind,
whether physical or mental, can be an incredibly isolating experience.
And isolation can drive you crazy.
Now, of course, in some circumstances, isolation is the only way that we know of
that we can deal with sickness and prevent it from spreading.
Right?
At a minor level, that's why my son's preschool sends home a big note that says,
if your child has a fever, or has had a fever in the last 24 hours, or has vomited,
you better not send him to school.
Right?
And every school and every daycare center has strict rules about that,
because they don't want diseases to spread, or more serious cases.
If you visit certain people in the hospital, you might have to wear a gown,
or even put on a mask, or put on gloves,
so they don't get what you have, and you don't get what they have.
Or for better and for worse, this is why we have psychiatric hospitals,
or institutions to keep people from harming themselves or harming others.
Right?
Normally, sickness is contagious.
Health isn't.
And so we protect against the spread of sickness,
partly by isolating sick people.
Now, in this passage, we see a very sick man, a leper,
a man with a dreaded skin disease.
Now, back then, the word leprosy covered a wide range of skin diseases,
including boils, burns, itches, ringworm, and scalp conditions,
as well as what's now called Hansen's disease,
leprosy that makes you lose feeling in your skin,
and your nerves, and your limbs, and eyes.
It was a horrible disease.
And back then, leprosy was nearly incurable.
It was a common saying among Jewish rabbis that curing a leper
was as difficult as raising a dead man to life.
And in order to prevent the dreaded disease from spreading,
lepers were required to be isolated from the rest of the community.
So Leviticus 13 and 14 give a whole bunch of rules,
but the end of Leviticus 13, starting at verse 45, says this,
the leprous person who has the disease
shall wear torn clothes
and let the hair of his head hang loose,
and he shall cover the lower part of his face
and cry out, unclean, unclean.
He shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease.
He is unclean.
He shall live alone.
His dwelling shall be outside the camp.
Did you hear those words?
Four times.
Unclean, unclean, unclean, unclean.
He shall live alone outside.
You see, being a leper didn't just make you sick,
it made you unclean and alone and isolated.
You were cut off from your family,
from your job, from your friends and your neighbors.
You couldn't touch anyone else
or even come close to them
because otherwise you would make them unclean.
So the only family, the only friends,
the only neighbors that you really had
were other people who had the same disease.
Other unclean lepers.
And you couldn't go into a city.
You couldn't go into any city with walls.
And so you had to live out in the unprotected countryside.
You could only attend the worship services in the synagogue
if they had a screen and a separate seating area
to separate you from everyone else.
It was an incredibly isolating experience.
It was a little bit like having AIDS in the 1970s or 1980s
when it was just beginning to spread
and before antiviral drugs were available.
Or maybe a parallel today would be
being homeless and sleeping on a bench on the green.
Or even under a bridge
and getting up in the morning
and pushing a shopping cart down the street
and hunting in other people's trash cans
for bottles and cans.
And everybody steps carefully around you
because they don't want to touch you.
Because in their eyes, you're dirty.
And you would make them unclean.
That's a little bit of what it was like
to be a leper.
To be unclean.
Now the leper in this story, he's a desperate man.
And so because he's desperate, he takes a risk.
He approaches Jesus.
And he pleads for help.
Now according to the law,
he wasn't supposed to come close to anyone else.
So he's taking a risk in even coming close to Jesus
and kneeling before him.
And he says, if you will, you can make me clean.
The leper sees something different in Jesus
that draws him to come close.
And in this passage, we see two extraordinary things
about Jesus.
We see Jesus' extraordinary authority
and we see Jesus' extraordinary compassion.
So first, Jesus' extraordinary authority.
Verses 41 and 42, it says,
Jesus was moved with pity or moved with compassion.
And he stretched out his hand and touched him
and said to him,
I will be clean.
And immediately the leprosy left him
and he was made clean.
Now do you notice Jesus deliberately stretched out his hand
and touched the man with leprosy?
According to the law,
if you touched an unclean person,
that made you unclean.
And if you became unclean,
you had to go through a whole process
of ritual cleansing,
of separating yourself from other people
and then bathing and going through this whole process
in order for you to become clean again.
Because again, just like today,
normally sickness and uncleanness spreads.
Health doesn't.
Right?
If you're unclean, you're contagious.
You might make somebody else unclean.
If you're healthy,
you're not going to make somebody else healthy
just by touching them.
But here, the effect is reversed.
When Jesus touches the leper,
instead of Jesus becoming unclean,
the leper becomes clean.
And if you were here last week,
we saw in this passage
that Jesus has this extraordinary authority,
this unequal power,
so that his touch overrides
and overrules this horrible skin disease.
And his will trumps
the Old Testament ceremonial law.
That Jesus has this amazing authority.
Now, according to the Old Testament,
the priests who served in the temple
had the responsibility to examine people
with skin disease
and pronounce them either clean or unclean.
They were a little bit like the doctors
in those days.
But you know,
Jesus doesn't merely act like a doctor here.
Jesus doesn't say,
hey, come here,
let me examine you.
Hmm, do I see any white spots?
No, I don't see any white spots.
Ah, you're okay.
No.
Jesus doesn't just pronounce him clean.
Jesus touches him and makes him clean.
He does what the priests could never do.
And that's why he says
what he says in verse 43 and 44.
Now, maybe that was a little confusing
when we first read it.
You might think,
well, why does Jesus say,
don't tell nothing to nobody?
It's actually a double negative in the Greek,
so you can translate it however you want.
The point is,
he says,
don't say anything to anyone.
I say,
well, why would Jesus want him
to keep it to himself?
Well,
the main reason is what he continues,
what he says in the rest of the verse.
Go,
show yourself to the priest.
Right?
You had to,
you had to get a clean bill of health
from the priest
so you could
be declared clean
and interact normally
with other people again
without making them unclean.
And as part of the process,
you'd offer a sacrifice
to thank God
for making you well
if somehow you recovered
from one of these skin diseases.
So basically,
Jesus is saying,
I want you to go through
the official legal channels
so that you can be publicly declared clean
and restored to your place in society.
But he also says,
at the end of verse 44,
he says,
do this for a proof to them.
It's a legal word,
proof or testimony.
In other words,
to demonstrate Jesus' authority
authority to the priests
and the religious leaders
of the day
so they could see
that this man
was living proof
that Jesus could do
what nobody else could.
So he says,
go to the priests
so they can see
that I've done for you
what nobody else can.
So they can examine you themselves
and they can have living proof
right in front of them
that I can do
what nobody else can.
So that's the first thing we see,
Jesus' extraordinary authority
to cleanse this man
where nobody else could.
But we also see a second thing.
We see Jesus' extraordinary compassion.
He not only cleanses the leper
where nobody else could,
he cleanses the leper
in a way that nobody else would.
Now verse 41,
it says Jesus was moved with pity.
Now when we hear that word pity,
sometimes we think something like this.
We think of maybe watching on the news
or hearing a really sad story
or looking down at somebody else
and thinking,
and we say,
oh, that's so sad.
We make a sad face
and maybe we just say sad things
for a few minutes.
And then we get distracted
and then we go on with our life
and we don't really do anything different.
And we think,
oh, I felt pity.
I felt so bad for that awful thing that happened.
Well, that's actually not
what true pity or compassion is in the Bible.
The English word compassion
is from a Latin word
that means to suffer with someone.
And the Greek word in this passage
refers to the,
it's a word that refers to
the inner parts of a person.
Literally the inner parts of your chest,
your gut,
your heart,
your lungs.
In other words,
compassion
is this deep feeling of mercy
towards somebody else
from deep inside you.
But it's not just a feeling,
it's a feeling
that results in action.
You see,
that's why Jesus touches the man.
He doesn't just feel pity for the man
and think,
oh, what a,
what a sad story.
But he reaches out and touches him.
Now,
Jesus didn't have to touch him
in order to make him well.
There's a story in the Old Testament,
probably the most famous story
in the Old Testament
of a leper being cleansed
is found in 2 Kings chapter 5.
And Naaman,
who is a commander,
who is an army commander in Syria,
goes to the prophet Elisha in Israel
and asks to be cleansed of his leprosy.
And Elisha
doesn't even come out of his house.
He sends a messenger
to say,
Naaman,
go dunk yourself in the river
seven times.
Naaman doesn't like that idea,
but eventually he
is persuaded by somebody else
that he should
at least try,
you know,
at least do what the prophet says.
So he does it,
and by the grace of God,
he gets cleansed.
But Elisha never touched him.
Jesus didn't have to touch him.
Actually,
in Luke chapter 17,
there's ten other lepers
that Jesus cleanses,
and he doesn't touch them at all.
So why does he touch him?
Think about it.
If you were that leper,
for as long as you've had leprosy,
nobody else has touched you.
Because nobody else wants to touch you
because they'll become unclean.
And the only other people
who might have touched you
were other people
who had the same disease.
And Jesus touched him
to make a personal connection with him.
That it wasn't just
blessings from a distance,
but it was blessings through
a touch.
But you know what?
There was a cost
to Jesus touching him.
And we don't,
you know,
you might not see this
when you first read the passage,
but look down at verse 44 and 45.
Verse 44,
Jesus tells the leper,
keep quiet
and go right to the priest.
But in verse 45,
the leper goes around
broadcasting the news.
He's talking freely,
or literally,
the word is preaching.
It's the same word
that's used for Jesus,
preaching his message.
The leper goes around
preaching about it.
Telling everybody.
And we have no idea
if he ever went to the priest or not.
And then it says,
as a result,
Jesus could no longer
openly enter a town,
but was out
in desolate places.
At the beginning of this story,
the leper
is on the outside.
He can't enter a town.
He can't touch anyone.
He can't participate
normally in society.
He's on the outside,
and he's unclean.
And Jesus is on the inside.
But at the end of the story,
it's reversed.
The leper's on the inside.
He's going everywhere.
He's clean.
He can touch anyone.
He's healed.
But Jesus is on the outside.
He can't enter a city.
He's in desolate places.
You see,
this whole story,
it's a little story
right at the beginning
of Mark's gospel,
but it's a picture
of the whole purpose
why Jesus came to the world.
The whole purpose
of his life and ministry
is about
his extraordinary authority
to do what nobody else could
and his extraordinary compassion
to do what nobody else would.
And of course,
where does that all lead?
Jesus in the end,
it ultimately leads him
to die on a cross
outside the city walls,
rejected
and alone
and unclean.
So that we,
like the leper,
might be cleansed
and accepted
and received
on the inside
of God's family
now
and forever.
that's what Jesus
came to do.
He came
to demonstrate
his authority
and he came
to touch us
with his compassion
at a great cost
to himself
so that we could be
cleansed
and received.
Now,
what do we take away
from this passage?
Let me give you
two categories
of applications.
Maybe we can talk
about these
a little more
when we have
our question
and answer time
in a few minutes.
Maybe you can identify
first,
maybe you can identify
with this leper.
Now,
maybe you have
an illness,
whether it's
a physical illness
or emotional
or some other
kind of illness
and because of
your illness,
you've lived
for years
in isolation
and you've always
felt excluded
on the outside.
Maybe you've
looked everywhere
for a cure
and found none
or maybe you've
given up
and you just
hang your head.
Or maybe it's not
a physical illness,
maybe you feel
dirty on the inside
because of shameful
things that other
people have done
to you in the past
and you feel like
damaged goods,
too broken
to ever be useful
again.
or maybe you feel
dirty because of
shameful things
that you've done
to yourself
or to other people.
And even if nobody
else knows the whole
story,
you know that on the
inside you're a mess
and you deal with
the shame
and guilt
of your own
failure before God
in the past
and even
daily
in the present.
If any of those
describe you,
let me invite you.
Come before
Jesus
like the leper
did.
He came to Jesus.
He said,
Jesus,
if you will,
you can make me
clean.
Jesus has the power
to make you clean
like nobody else
can.
And Jesus
did
what was required
to make you
clean
like nobody else
would.
You know,
one of the biggest
lies in the world
is that you have
to clean yourself
up
before you come
to God,
before you come
to church.
And the truth
is exactly the
opposite.
You need to come
to Jesus
so that He
can clean you
up.
And you'll find
Jesus here
in the church.
Not in this
building,
but when believers
gather together.
Jesus is present
here with us
to cleanse us
and heal us.
And you know,
in reality,
every single
one of us
is like this
leper
before God.
Before God,
we're all
unclean.
In the Bible,
it says,
all our righteous
deeds are like
filthy,
blood-stained
rags.
So what's the
church?
The church is a
bunch of
desperate
lepers
who found
cleansing
in Jesus.
So whoever
you are,
whatever you
look like on
the outside,
and whatever
you feel on
the inside,
you're not
any different
from all the
rest of us
when we stand
before God.
to all of
us.
Jesus invites
all of us
to come
to Him
as you
are.
Maybe
come to
Him for
the first
time.
Or maybe
come to
Him for
a renewed
experience
of His
mercy
and His
cleansing.
So that's
the first
thing.
Maybe you
identify with
the leper.
We all
identify with
the leper.
Maybe,
second thing,
maybe you
identify
as a
follower of
Jesus,
as a
disciple of
Jesus.
As we've
said,
the church
is a
community
of people
like this
leper,
who are
spiritually
unclean,
and excluded
from God's
family,
who have
been brought
in by the
authority and
compassion of
Jesus Christ.
But you
know,
we're also
called to be
a community
that extends
Jesus'
compassion and
proclaims Jesus'
authority in
the world.
So what
does that
look like?
Well,
it looks like
being a
community where
we don't
ignore or
avoid people
when they
get sick
or weak,
but instead
reach out to
them and
touch them and
connect with
them.
A few weeks
ago, I had
the chance to
visit a lady
named Miss
Frances.
Miss Frances
is an elderly
member of this
church.
Many of you
won't know her
because she
hasn't been able
to come to
church regularly
for a few
years.
She's lost
most of her
short-term
memory, and
she lives in
a care facility
full-time.
When I arrived
to visit her,
she recognized
me because
I've been in
this church for
long enough that
she remembered
me, and we
were walking
towards where
we were going
to sit down,
and she said
to somebody
else, one of
the staff at
the place,
she said,
see, my
church hasn't
forgotten me.
Now, you know,
she wasn't just
talking about me
because I've only
been to visit her
once or twice in
the last year,
but there are
one or two or
more people from
this church who
have taken it
upon themselves to
visit her regularly,
and she remembers
who they are.
Even though she's
lost most of her
short-term memory,
she remembers the
people from church
who've come to
visit her, and she
said to me, my
church hasn't
forgotten me, and
it's a sign to her
and to everybody
else around her
that Jesus hasn't
forgotten her.
Right?
Now, sometimes we
do this well, and
sometimes we don't
do this well, but
this is part of what
it looks like.
A community where we
reach out and
connect with people
when they're sick
or weak.
And second, a
community that
extends Jesus'
compassionate touch
to outsiders.
believers.
This leper was an
outsider back in
the day.
He was somebody
that most religious
people didn't want
to deal with, because
it was too messy, and
too complicated, and
too time-consuming, and
seemingly hopeless from
a human point of view,
but he's exactly the
kind of person that
Jesus touched.
And so as followers of
Jesus, we're called to
touch others, to
engage with people
who are broken,
needy, dirty, smelly,
rejected, alone, sick,
in the hospital, have
complicated issues, and
are spiritual outsiders.
Now, there's a cost to
doing that.
Right?
It costs time, and
energy, and money.
Sometimes you get funny
looks from people.
They say, why are you
hanging out with them?
Why did you invite them
to come along with us
when we were just going
to hang out?
Right?
That's what Jesus did.
He invited us to come
and be with him when we
didn't deserve to.
Now, we can't do
everything.
We can't touch every
single, lonely, isolated
person in this city.
We don't have the power
to fix people.
Only Jesus does.
Sometimes people aren't
willing to be made
clean.
But, you know, we know
Jesus.
He has the only cure
that really works.
And so, let's extend
his compassionate touch
so that other people
might experience that,
his cleansing,
and being received into
his family, just as
each one of us have,
who have put our trust
in him.
Let's pray.
Lord Jesus, we praise
you for your authority.
Lord, your power.
Lord, that you could
touch that man.
That you can touch
people today and make
us clean.
Lord, not only physically
on the outside,
but spiritually
on the inside.
Lord Jesus, we thank
you for your compassion.
That you have paid the
price on the cross.
That we might be
cleansed of all our
sin and guilt.
That we might be
received into your
family.
As people who belong
to you.
And are loved and
known by you.
Lord, we pray that we
would, each of us,
recognize that we are
no different than this
leper when we stand
before you.
And we pray that
because we realize
that, and because we
have experienced
your saving grace,
Lord, that we would
extend your touch
to others.
We pray this in your
name.
Amen.